Hla Byu's outlook was too Eastern to be contemplated by any woman of
the West. Very much the dog's point of view.
There is endless talk about the faithfulness of dogs, but does not
experience teach that it really consists of faithfulness to a master
rather than to one master? The dog who loses one master, to be
kindly adopted by another, suffers from the change only until he has
grown accustomed to the new touch upon his head. His heart beats as
happily in a little while to the new tread along the garden walk. He
is still faithful in his allegiance--to the hand that feeds him.
When the old master returns he will remember, till then he will
philosophize.
The Burmese woman who is sold to the white man has this advantage
over his dog. The Unexpected does not occur. She knows that she
will, possibly, change masters more than once in her life. She may
prefer one to another, but, in most cases, the change is accepted
philosophically and is followed by few heart-burnings and useless
regrets. So that the man be just to her and kind, so that he clothe
her and approve of her housekeeping, she is content. Her
lighthearted affection goes to the children, who are bone of her
bone, and of whom she need not stand in awe.
If the man has any notion of fair play, when the time comes for him
to leave her, he will provide for the children; if he deny all
responsibility, there are still the missions, who look upon such
things with solemn and sentimental eyes, and are, consequently,
helpful.
Cyprian learnt during the next two years to understand this enduring
passivity of the Buddha's children. Not that they followed blindly
the precepts of the Great Teacher: they had simply adapted them to
the changing times and needs of the Race.
Little Hla Byu was a regular attendant on festival occasions at the
Aracan Pagoda in Mandalay. She knelt before the big gold Buddha,
solid from many coatings of precious metal, when the flickering
candles dripped grease, and the scent of the incense-sticks
penetrated through the scent of perspiring humanity.
There, she prayed for her son. She did not consciously connect him
with the foreign father who might, any day, desert her for a woman of
his own race, and legitimately deny all that linked him to his former
life. She prayed quaintly, mechanically, regarding the proceeding in
the light of a charm, and with no very clear idea as to who should
hear the prayer. The priests should know. But the priests, indeed,
if they knew anything up at their bare stone monastery, should have
taught that the Master could not hear the cry of human suffering or
desire, even if he would, since he had obtained the final Silence,
"where beyond these voices there is peace." But, to Hla Byu, spirits
there must be--Someone, Anyone. Prayer could do no harm, anyway, and
might certainly do good. Contemplation was not for the
Burman-in-the-street, but any follower of the Buddha can hold a
wooden rosary and repeat two thousand times in a dull monotone, some
such golden truth as that "Honesty is the best policy," before
leaving the lighted Pagoda and going back to the bazaar to cheat his
brother.
At least, her creed gave some outlet to those emotions which the
practical things of life cannot satisfy.
She was richer than Cyprian, who had none. The simple honesty of her
beautified their relationship. Nature, surely, must have meant just
this simplicity between the sexes in ministering to each other's
needs. He knew that Ferlie would have been struck with the hypocrisy
of Society-life in the big towns of Burma.
There the white women-folk knew of such as little Hla Byu but
pretended ignorance. No aspiring mother would encourage her daughter
to join hands with an ex-public-school boy at the beginning of his
career and flit away into the jungles to share the making of his
future. That was Hla Byu's part. But, later, when the same future
was assured, when the public-school boy had become submerged in the
fever-eaten official with a bank-book and, possibly, a
passion-ravaged past, then it was the turn of some clear-eyed
débutante to receive with thankfulness God's gift of a good man's
love--and his motor-car.
* * * * * *
Cyprian's face, bent over the official note-paper upon which he had
been idly sketching while listening to the klop-klop of the postman's
mule mounting the hill, was less lean now and far less strained. The
great bitterness curving the corners of his mouth was contradicted by
the level calm with which his eyes looked out across to the horizon
despite their awareness that the Lot had fallen unto him in a rugged
ground.
A slight stir in the vicinity of the waste-paper basket caused him to
turn his head, and, with an oddly detached air, he surveyed for some
moments the explorations therein of a naked baby.
Its creamy amber skin shone like satin in the sunlight, relieved by
its stiff cap of black hair. And the eyes riveted suddenly upon
Cyprian's were widely set apart and, most incongruously, most
tellingly, blue.
The man, unexpectedly, with a brusque movement of his head, shook
down the eye-glasses he used to correct his astigmatic vision when
concentrating for long upon close writing, and the small inquiring
face receded, mercifully blurred.
But its marked and precocious intelligence remained branded upon his
mentality as if somebody had pasted an imperfectly-developed
photograph there.
"One is responsible," and he turned the word over in his mind,
stupidly probing its meaning.
Hla Byu picked up the restless bundle as she flitted into the shaded
gloom of the sitting-room, out of the white glare blocked by the
verandah chicks.
Cyprian absently received his letters from her hands.
"The school is in Maymyo," he said inconsequently. "It will be best
for him to go where there will be others like him."
The puzzled wonderment of her expression merged into amusement. She
had learnt something of this man during the last two years.
Something, also, of latent powers in herself which he would have paid
much, in after life, to have left unstirred. She gave a tiny
exclamatory chirp of laughter.
"At fourteen months, Thakin? That would, indeed, be somewhat early,
even for him."
With relief he recalled that the time for such decisions was not yet.
One might drift a little longer....
But Fate disproved that. Among the official letters lay one in a
strange handwriting. He turned it over incuriously, but there was a
seal on the back which quickened his interest. He could not
recollect where he had seen it before. The first words of the letter
startled him.
"Dear Ferlie's Cyprian,"--Stiffening, he turned the sheet over to
read the signature, "B. Trefusis." Then he remembered. A
tea-shop.... Ferlie buried in ice-cream and, to the right of her, a
vivacious shingled head ... the same seal on a thin white wrinkled
finger, curved over a plate of honey-coloured scones. He spread the
letter out upon the blotting-paper and, resting his drawn forehead on
sheltering palms, read it slowly through.
"If you were ever a friend of Ferlie's, try and come to her. Once, I
should have said, if you were ever a friend of Ferlie's try and leave
her. I never considered you a successful substitute for the uncle
she did not possess, but the very difference in age between you,
which I deplored, I now rejoice in. Perhaps, she will confide in
you; perhaps, you will be able to help where the few that are near
and dear to her are excluded from helping.
"For all I know, you may have forgotten that there ever was a Ferlie.
This may find you with another woman at your side. You may have
ties--children; then, for their sakes, come and hold out your hand in
friendship to a child you once knew. I am not satisfied with the
little I gleaned about her marriage. I am not satisfied with the
accounts I heard of you then. The only thing I am satisfied about is
that Ferlie needs you and would tell you what she will not tell me.
Perhaps, you may have the key to the whole situation; perhaps, you
know nothing. At any rate, if you were ever a friend of Ferlie's
come and learn."
After all, the ties which held him were slenderer than cobwebs;
surprising the ease with which he snapped them.
Hla Byu did not question. She merely accepted. But her slanting
brows creased painfully.
"Will the Thakin let me come back to him?"
Through the rising tumult of his mind he detected the note of alarm.
"There is nothing to fear," he told her. "I will arrange for regular
money to be supplied to you. The child shall be provided for all
during his life."
The momentary relief in her face struck a feeling of shame to
Cyprian's soul. There were men, he knew, who would consider him
quixotic. He blinked away the thought. Custom could not lessen the
dominion of the Daimon in this matter. Responsible. For all that he
had made of life. For the weakness which had originally driven him
from his acknowledged sphere. For the narrowness which had spurned
Ferlie's confidence in its rightful setting; for the indecision which
had kept him from following his truest instincts to love and to
declare his love; for the apathetic purposelessness through which he
had accepted Burma's bribe of Hla Byu, and the child with the
questioning blue eyes.
"What will happen no one can foretell," he said. "Serve another
Thakin, or wait; in either case you can always appeal to me for your
needs."
Seemingly satisfied, she nodded and then turned from him to hide
something on her lashes which made rainbows of the sunshine. She had
always been a little afraid of him, although he never got drunk, nor
beat her, nor threw things about the house as she knew, from her
friends, so many foreign masters did. He was always silent,
work-absorbed, apart from her--it was like living with the marble
Buddha on the river-bank, who eternally contemplated, in the
regulation attitude, the water traffic slipping by on its very mortal
affairs, from town to town. She clutched the baby to her in a spasm
of passionate regret--although, of course, there remained nothing to
regret since their future was assured.
"It has been peace here, Thakin?" she said, on a timid note of
interrogation.
He laid a gentle hand upon the yielding shoulder; her tiny bones felt
soft like a kitten's bones.
"It is never peace for long, child," he answered.
* * * * * *
He had wired the date of his arrival to Miss Trefusis; the compromise
of a reply to the letter he had not felt capable of answering. But
he was not prepared to see the severely stately figure of that
decisive lady waiting at the docks.
She greeted him as if they had parted yesterday.
"People remain vivid to me," she said in explanation, leading him to
the closed limousine. "We are motoring to my place near town, and
your heavy luggage can go by train. You are coming to stay with me
until you've had time to choose your roost. On the way down in the
car I can elucidate. Meanwhile, a brief catechism will clear the
air. Married?"
Cyprian shook his head.
"I am glad," said the old lady. "Your having no responsibilities
will simplify matters. Was leave due to you?"
"I took 'Urgent Private Affairs'."
"Good. They should more than occupy your attention. Get in."
Her hand directed him towards the car.
Cyprian obeyed, hypnotized. Once they were seated she swung sideways
to look him full in the face.
"Do you know why I have risked this? For love of Ferlie. You might
have consigned me to the devil, had you developed into an official of
high standing, very much married, with a brace of inarticulate,
spectacled children. Instinct told me that you were alone in spirit,
even if among your fellow-men; overworking, and living at the bottom
of a mine, not of rubies, but of buried hopes. Was I right?"
He nodded, blinking nervously at his hands. Her voice had lost its
hard-edged clarity.
"When I saw you two, one afternoon at the Zoo--you remember?--I
thought that the link, strengthening between you as the years went
on, was wholly unnatural. You were Ferlie's sun, though neither of
you realized it. And she stood to you for refreshment and comfort
and utter peace. Again--Was I right?"
He stirred uneasily.
"Can you not spare me this?"
"No," said Aunt Brillianna emphatically. "I can spare you nothing if
Ferlie is to be spared a little. Listen."
She lowered her tone and, above the humming of the car, her voice ran
on earnestly. Pain was again wrenching at his nerves and the
sentences sounded blurred and disconnected....
"And no one knows the real truth. They are not, officially,
separated, but she lives alone at Black Towers with John, her little
boy...."
A companion of lesser perception might have faltered discouraged
before his immobility. This one had the good sense to keep her eyes
upon the shifting hedges.
"She tells us nothing, and lives like a nun, cloistered in her
pathetic youth behind the walls of that crumbling old tomb.
Mainwaring fills the town house with his friends, and there are queer
stories afloat about him. He has never shown any interest in the
child--looks upon its arrival as a duty mutually performed. There
has been no public quarrel; no cruelty that we know of, and the
rumours, however unsavoury, do not provide the evidence for divorce
proceedings. In any case, Ferlie has joined the Church of Rome.
Gave no explanation why; merely announced it as an accomplished fact.
I saw a marble statue once, called 'Endurance.' It was in a private
show, by an unknown man. A nude figure with hands extended to push
back some invisible advancing foe. I bought it. There is terror in
the face, lest the unknown power should crush completely; but there
is also cold resistance and the strength of despair. I will show you
the thing. You, who remember Ferlie as so poignantly alive...."
The speaker broke off for a moment.
"... But I must come to the incident which prompted my letter to you.
I had gone unexpectedly to Black Towers, and only John greeted me in
that mausoleum of a hall. He is a Ferlie product all right, but only
just four. And ... one never knows.... The servants told me that
Lady Greville-Mainwaring was at home but could not be disturbed. I
asked if she were ill. They denied that and, politely resistant to
further inquiries, supplied me with papers, afternoon tea, and, being
well acquainted with my erratic habits, asked if I would stay the
night. I said 'yes,' and turned my whole attention to John in the
hope of discovering what his mother was doing.
"'No one could ever go up between five and six,' he informed me.
'But go up where, John?' I asked. With some difficulty I extracted
the fact that Ferlie was in the West Tower. I knew there were unused
rooms in the towers. I asked him what his mother did there between
five and six, and he said she shut the door and 'just was quiet,'
adding proudly that he took her up messages if it was important.
"I hated the sound of these proceedings which he evidently regarded
as normal. 'This is important, John,' I said. 'We won't tell
anybody else, but you take me up to Mother.' He demurred at
first--thought the occasion did not justify that weary journey--but,
at last, I persuaded him. The steps were high and dark and narrow.
We might have been perambulating in Dante's Purgatory as we circled
round and round. We stopped outside the door of a circular room. So
strict were her orders that she had ceased to expect intrusion, and
only a curtain hid her from us. I stood for some while behind it,
listening to the silence. John, queer intense little soul that he
is, sat down on the top step nursing his legs, for he was never very
strong and I suppose they ached from the climb. And suddenly perched
up at that height in the dark, relieved only by the spears of
ghost-coloured light shooting through the slit windows behind us on
the stair, I lost my nerve and felt that, dishonourable or not, I
must know what Ferlie was doing. If she had turned into a witch in
that setting I was not prepared to be surprised."
Miss Trefusis stopped to wipe from her face the dampness which had
gathered there. She gave a little gasp and moistened her lips.
"Cyprian. I stood and peeped through the curtain folds at a room
soaked in gold light. I thought I was demented until I realized that
the rays of the western sun must touch this turret last of any room
in the house, and then they struck through a round aperture glazed
with orange glass. When no longer dazzled by the discovery I found
Ferlie. The place was unfurnished save for a cushioned oak chair in
which she was sitting, motionless as if she had been dead for years.
On the palm of one opened hand lay a spherical object which retained
at one spot a pin-point of reflected light like a minute star. On
this it seemed to me Ferlie's eyes were fixed, and, even when
throwing discretion to the winds, I went in to her she neither spoke
nor stirred.
"I stooped low to her face and realized that she could not be aware
of my presence. She was in some sort of a trance. Terrified, my
first idea was to rush for help. Mercifully, I thought better of it.
I did not know what kind of help was needed. I could only guess that
Ferlie was self-hypnotized. But with what object? And had the thing
been accidental, or deliberate. Not daring to pick up what she held
in her hand I saw it was a small golden apple.
"I went back to John and asked him where the nearest doctor lived.
We were some while whispering while I dug for information, and during
that delay I heard Ferlie give a long sigh. Back I sped to her side.
The apple had rolled into her lap and her body relaxed as I hovered
round like a distracted hen. Then, to my joy, I perceived that she
was realizing me. She did not seem astonished, and lifting her head
spoke as if hardly out of a dream.
"'Nearly,' she said. 'Very nearly. But there is always some
Presence standing between him and myself--and it is not God.'
"I was tactful and apologetic, putting the blame of my intrusion on
to John and pretending I saw nothing out of the way in finding her in
the turret.
"But, later, by deduction and confidences half-won, I arrived at some
sort of explanation. Ferlie had been dipping deep into the
ultra-ancient and ultra-modern volumes of every species of literature
which stock the Black Towers library.
"'Do you believe that mankind have lost the power of communicating
with one another by thought-transference?' she asked me. 'If they
ever had it,' I said, determined not to encourage her.
"But her face checked my inclination to snub.
"'Christ had it,' she said. 'He healed _from a distance_, and
promised that all He did we might do. No one seems to have taken
that promise seriously enough to test it--unless perhaps the
Christian Scientists.'
"'I'd prefer to rely upon the twopenny post, myself,' I insisted.
She shook her head and said, 'That would not be right in my case,
Aunt B. I may only struggle to attain the fulfilment of the promise.'
"'With whom do you want to communicate by this unnatural method,' I
asked. But she would not tell me. Only by accident I stumbled upon
that item.
"Late that same night I heard through my open window a faint sound of
somebody crying. It was one of those desperately still
star-saturated nights. I was up in an instant and along the corridor
without waiting for a candle. Ferlie's room was next to John's.
Through his open door I watched her, but this time I did not rush in
to put to flight any stray ministering angel who might be in the
offing. Cyprian, it is a terrible thing to come, unawares, upon a
soul in Gethsemane. What has lain between you two in the past I do
not know; what may lie between you in the future I dare not think.
But I at my eavesdropping post grew colder and colder. If Ferlie
continued much longer to carry this secret burden I was certain she
would go out of her mind. And I am convinced that whatever the
stereotyped and doubtless to your mind worthy, principles to which
you have succumbed in this matter, no man can count himself wholly
irresponsible whose name is thus centred in a woman's prayers."
The great car swept forward, increasing speed along a clear stretch
of road. Between the occupants for some moments there reigned an
unbroken silence.
Then Cyprian spoke, still without moving; his rigidity outlined
against the transparent pane.
"How far are we from Black Towers?"
"We pass within thirty miles of it."
"Then...." Their eyes met.
Aunt B.'s head jerked suddenly forward.
"I thought you'd understand." ...